


are you a witch? 'cause i'm under your spell

by jilliancares



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cat Keith (Voltron), M/M, Neighbors, Witch Keith (Voltron), keith can turn into a cat, keith owns a shop, lance is desperate to pet a cat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:07:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27303883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jilliancares/pseuds/jilliancares
Summary: Keith is a witch who can turn into a cat. Lance is his neighbor who doesn't realize Keith can turn into a cat.
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 133
Kudos: 936





	are you a witch? 'cause i'm under your spell

**Author's Note:**

> happy halloween everyone!!! please enjoy some fun, witchy vibes !!

To be completely fair, it starts on accident.

It’s one of those days in the beginning of fall where the sun is high in the blue, cloudless sky and you can almost _taste_ the changing of the seasons in the air. One of the last truly warm days before all the leaves change color and you’re bundled in scarves and boots for the next several months.

And seeing as Keith spends a lot of his time working, he’d set out to truly enjoy this day. No customers demanding potions immediately when they take at least a week to brew. No teenagers that are clearly not old enough to purchase age-restricted spells, puffing out their chests and speaking in a deeper register as if that’ll be enough to convince Keith not to ask for their ID. No pompous idiots telling Keith that, _actually, my aunt’s friend is a witch and she makes this potion with sage, not bergamot, so I know for a fact that you’re scamming me._

Keith had great plans for his day off. Namely, napping in his well-loved and well-tended garden.

There’s this one area near the fence where bees are often buzzing quietly in the flowers, the sun having warmed the mulch to a perfect degree, and ever since Keith discovered it, he’s had some of the best naps of his entire life. Sure, he has to be a cat to be able to actually fit there amongst all the different plants, but he tends to nap better as a cat anyway.

The only problem to his perfect plan, as it turns out, is Lance.

Lance, his well-meaning, cute, but ultimately annoying neighbor. The guy knows Keith’s a witch, but he clearly has no idea that Keith can also turn into a cat, otherwise there’s no way in hell Keith would currently be experiencing… well. _This_.

“C’mere!” Lance coos, leaning over the fence with a hand extended toward Keith. It’s a pretty high fence, and Lance has managed to get his hand almost all the way to the ground, which leads Keith to believe that Lance isn’t so much as standing on the other side of the fence but actively hanging over it, his feet dangling on the other side.

“Here, pretty-little-kitty-kitty!” Lance continues, wiggling his fingers and sounding out of breath. Definitely balancing on the fence on his stomach, then. “Here, kitty kitty!”

Keith just blinks at Lance, wishing he were unable to actually believe this was happening. Unfortunately, the entire situation stinks of something Lance would be able to concoct. Only Lance would be able to go three months without realizing Keith was a witch, finally blow up at the realization and pester Keith for two weeks straight about everything that’s true and everything that’s a myth about witches, only to end up standing at Keith’s fence and beckoning a cat that is, in fact, Keith.

Finally, with a huff, Lance drops back down to his side of the fence. Like this, he’s only visible from the chest up, but his hands are curled around the fence and he’s still looking down at Keith with the widest eyes.

“You’re such a cute little kitty,” he tells Keith. “Does bad Mr. Keith keep you outside? Huh?”

If Keith could roll his eyes as a cat, he would.

Lance looks toward Keith’s house and Keith gets the worst feeling that Lance is checking for his presence, actively debating whether he should jump the fence in order to pet a fucking cat, which is where Keith draws the line. If he has to give up his favorite napping spot, so be it.

He stands, earning an awed gasp from Lance for doing absolutely anything, and starts walking in the direction of his house.

“Nooo,” Lance moans, Keith’s ears flicking back to better hear him. “Come back, Mr. Whiskers, I’ll love you more!”

Mr. Whiskers? God, has he _named_ Keith?

Still, Lance has the good sense not to jump Keith’s fence — though probably from the realization that “Mr. Whiskers” is unlikely to let him pet him rather than because a witch growing very important plants is likely to _ward his own yard_ — and that’s that.

Even so, after Keith has retreated indoors through the self-installed cat-flap (what? Sometimes you want to get places without needing to use doorknobs!), he makes sure to go through the slightly arduous process of becoming human again and makes an allowance for Lance within those wards. Not because he has any sort of affinity for Lance, mind you, but because the idiot might actually decide to jump the fence one day in search for Mr. Whiskers, and Keith doesn’t really like the idea of finding Lance laying prone in his garden, his legs having stopped working due to a particularly useful leg-numbing curse.

\--

Less than a week later, Keith is interrupted by the doorbell in the middle of brewing a pretty difficult potion.

He’s in his lab, the windows shut and the doors closed because this potion tends to be on the more volatile side and he doesn’t want any sort of atmospheric changes to fuck it up. He’s just about to add the most important ingredient — something that’ll make the frankly disgusting-looking potion turn baby blue if it’s been brewed right, but will make it explode if it’s been brewed wrong — when the doorbell rings so clearly and suddenly that Keith jumps, almost dropping the thyme in on accident.

Keith glances at the door of his lab, debating leaving the front door unanswered, when the doorbell goes off a second time and he groans. He sets a stasis charm over the potion, leaves the thyme sitting beside it, and escapes his lab almost gratefully, sweating from the heat of the room. His hair’s gone frizzy from the heat despite being pulled back into a bun and his shirt is sticking to him, his sleeves rolled up. Regardless of his appearance, he pulls open the front door.

Lance.

“Um, hi,” Keith says.

“Keith! You smell like mint,” Lance greets.

“Thyme,” Keith corrects. “I’m brewing something.”

“Sweet,” Lance says. “Witch things. Love it.”

“Right,” Keith says. “Can I help you?”

“Actually, I wanted to give you something,” Lance says, grinning.

Lance is possibly the only person who manages to grin with all his teeth. Keith swears it’s blinding, and he’s not sure how Lance manages to look so happy while doing it, each and every time. It seems like Lance is willing to hand those smiles out to just anybody, from old women walking down the street to girl scouts to Keith, sweaty and disgusting from brewing all day.

“Oh,” Keith says, both confused and a little touched. Lance pulls his hands out from behind his back, revealing, “A… fountain?”

“It’s for cats!” Lance says. “I saw your cat in the garden the other day, and I used to have cats growing up. I can’t afford one right now, but… Well, my cats loved these things. There’s just something about running water, y’know?”

“Right,” Keith says.

“Hopefully he likes it. She?”

“He,” Keith manages.

“I left the receipt in case he doesn’t,” Lance says. “No big deal. Where is the little guy, anyway?” He’s leaning to the side, now, looking past Keith and into the house in search of Keith’s cat.

“Oh, Mr. Whiskers is upstairs sleeping,” Keith says, for some unknown reason, and Lance gasps, reeling backward to look at Keith in astonishment.

“Dude!” he says. “You’re never gonna believe this, but that’s what I thought he was called! Did you tell me that at some point and I just forgot?”

“I don’t think so,” Keith says, because for some reason continuing with this elaborate lie seems more plausible in the moment than just telling Lance that he is, in fact, Mr. Whiskers.

“That’s insane!” Lance says. “I’m a cat whisperer, I swear! Anyway, uh, enjoy the fountain.” Lance takes a step back, looking a little embarrassed, and then turns and practically runs down the path. Keith is left standing on his porch holding a fountain for a cat, not quite understanding why he now owns it in the first place.

For the record, Mr. Whiskers enjoys the fountain immensely. Turns out there _is_ something about running water.

\--

The next time Keith runs into Lance, he is, unfortunately, a cat again.

He’d been avoiding spending any time as a cat outdoors because of his first accidental run-in with Lance, but without the threat of “Mr. Whiskers” maintaining the yard, small animals started to make a reappearance. And with an abundance of ingredients that Keith actually needs for charms and potions growing in his yard without any kinds of pesticides, that’s really not an option.

Needless to say, Keith spent a good amount of time outside scaring off plant-predators and making his presence known again. He only realizes his mistake when he comes strutting into the front lawn, feeling both proud and productive. Lance is walking down the sidewalk, his hands in his pockets, and any hopes Keith has of Lance not noticing him are dashed almost immediately. Lance happens to glance to the side, Keith happens to be standing there, and Lance’s gasp is deafening in his excitement.

He drops immediately to the ground, sitting there with his legs crossed and his hand extended and a never-ending barrage of kissy sounds escaping his mouth.

Keith is just about to hightail it out of there when he remembers his last conversation with Lance. His clear excitement over Mr. Whiskers, his admission that he couldn’t afford pets at the moment but had owned cats growing up. Fuck, even the fact that he _bought Keith a cat-fountain_ despite being unable to afford a cat himself.

Clearly, the guy’s in desperate need of attention from a cat.

With resignation, Keith turns toward Lance, his tail already flicking with annoyance. Lance visibly holds in a squeal, stretching his arm out even further, if that’s possible.

“Heeere, Mr. Whiskers!” he calls, his voice hushed, and Keith braces himself just outside of Lance’s reach. He just has to let Lance pet him this one time and that’ll probably fill Lance’s quota of cat related needs. Lance will forget about Mr. Whiskers and Keith can move on with his life, forgetting that he ever let this happen.

Finally, he steps close enough to Lance to be pet, ignoring his whispered, “Yesss!” and sniffing the hand Lance has extended toward him. He smells clean, like soap and laundry and suspiciously like thyme, for whatever reason.

Lance takes this gesture as a proclamation of _pet me all you want_ and starts in immediately. His hand swoops down from Keith’s head and then down his back. Keith’s fatal mistake is tipping his head backward when Lance’s finger sneaks under his chin, because it feels surprisingly good and he wants to give Lance as much room to work with as possible.

And it’s — God. Lance has _magic hands_. It feels like nothing Keith would’ve ever expected, and he realizes in that moment that never in his life has he let someone pet him before.

It makes sense, at least. Keith retains his own mind when in the body of a cat, and not many people know he can turn into a cat in the first place. But clearly, he’s been missing out on something incredible.

He doesn’t even mind when Lance scoops him up, plopping Keith in his lap and proceeding to scratch every itch Keith’s never known he’s had. Keith’s purring for the first time in… he can’t even remember how long, but it’s fine. Everything’s fine.

At least, until Lance says, “Are you outside all alone, little guy? Where’s your human, huh?”

Keith barely takes in the words until Lance is standing, holding Keith securely in his arms and approaching his front door, which no one will answer. It’s not until Lance loosens his grip on Keith in order to ring the doorbell that Keith finally escapes his hold, missing the warmth of his chest immediately.

“Mr. Whiskers!” Lance gasps, staring at him with something similar to betrayal, but Keith darts away from him and into the backyard without a backward glance, not wanting to be there when Lance finally gives up from the lack of response at the front door.

Sure, it felt nice to be pet by Lance, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to happen ever again. Once was enough, and both he and Lance are just going to have to accept that.

\--

Over the next week, Keith finds himself repeating that mantra. He throws himself into his work, doing his best to keep busy and stop thinking about Lance and his stupid magic hands. He brews potions and stays late at the store and sells customers charms and talismans.

He’s been doing such a good job of distracting himself and avoiding Lance, in fact, that he forgot that Lance even knew where he worked.

“Hey, Keith!” Lance says cheerily as he walks through the door, the chime above his head announcing his presence. Keith nearly drops the potion he’s holding at the sound of his voice, plastering a smile on his face when he remembers that Lance is technically a customer.

“Hey,” Keith says. Inwardly, he’s thinking that Lance must be really fucking obsessed with his cat to follow him all the way to work in hopes of… what? It’s not like he should expect to see Mr. Whiskers at the shop, knowing that Mr. Whiskers lives at Keith’s house. Unless he thinks that Keith brings him everywhere with him? Or maybe he’s trying to get on Keith’s good side, so that he can get invited over to his house and see Mr. Whiskers more.

Well, that’s never going to happen. It’ll be impossible to both entertain Lance and have a cat present, unless Keith goes out and finds a black cat that looks similar enough to him. But then he’d actually have to take _care_ of the cat, and the cat might hate his guts whenever _he’s_ in cat-form.

God, Keith never should’ve let Lance pet him.

“I was just in town, figured I’d finally check out your shop,” Lance says, peering around the store. “What should I buy?”

“What do you need?” Keith asks.

“Iunno.” Lance shrugs. “A potion, maybe?”

Keith shakes his head, amused despite himself, and starts down one of the aisles. “Maybe a good luck charm,” he says, pointing them out. “A talisman against solicitors? A cold and flu potion?”

“Sounds like medicine.”

“Mine works better.”

Lance hums, picking up the good luck charm and then closing his fist around it. “I could use some luck,” he decides, and Keith leads him back to the counter, ringing him up.

“So,” Lance continues, leaning his elbows on the counter. “Can I see some magic in action?”

Keith stares at him, taking in Lance’s pleading eyes and guilty smile. Normally, he’d say no. He’s had customers who have asked him before. A lot of people have never actually _seen_ magic before, despite frequenting witches’ shops. It makes sense, because being a witch and selling your services doesn’t mean you want your magic on display.

But Lance is… well, he looks really hopeful. And he _is_ Keith’s neighbor, which means he’ll have to see him again after this, even if he does reject him rudely. Not to mention, Lance kind of did him a favor already, with those expert-level pets…

“Sure,” Keith finally says, and Lance whoops, straightening up to look at Keith more clearly.

“What are you gonna do?!” he asks. “Make things float? Cast a curse? Actually, no, surprise me!”

Keith laughs despite himself. He grabs a box from under the counter and hands it to Lance. “Here’s your purchase,” he says.

“No, I’ve got it right—” Lance opens his hand, now free of the charm he bought, and gasps. “ _No way_!”

“Have a good day, Lance,” Keith says, leaning against the counter. Lance nods, mumbling something almost incoherent, and then he’s gone.

\--

Just a few days after that, Keith cracks.

Somehow, some _way_ … he ends up at Lance’s front door. There’s just something about him, something really funny or likeable or — or maybe he just really wants to get pet again.

He’s a cat, because even though part of him really enjoyed talking with Lance in the shop, he doesn’t quite have the guts to just stroll up to Lance’s door as himself. He lowers himself enough to meow at the door a few times and feels grateful when he realizes that Lance heard him, the door swinging open.

“Huh,” Lance says, looking at his wrist. The charm is now affixed there with a little chain. “Not exactly who I was hoping this would summon, but close.”

Keith has just a second to try and comprehend that before Lance is scooping him up, holding him like a baby and scratching him under his chin. “But you’re such a cute, pretty boy I can hardly be mad about it!” he coos.

And if he didn’t want Mr. Whiskers, that must mean he wanted…

“You’re just a _baby_!” Lance tells him, and it’s not right but Keith can’t exactly correct him, so.

He ends up spending the afternoon in Lance’s house. Lance should probably be concerned, because what if Keith was actually out there looking for Mr. Whiskers right now, but Lance hardly thinks twice about it. He just moves around his kitchen assuredly as he puts together some elaborate meal, occasionally stopping to pet Keith, who’s laying on the counter watching him.

Lance talks to him the whole time, about his day and what he’s making and even, occasionally, about Keith himself. Just off-handed things, really, always referring to him as “your human” or “your owner,” but Keith can’t help tuning in extra hard whenever Lance happens to mention him.

Similarly, Keith can’t help being impressed by the meal Lance puts together. Keith can brew a potion to perfection and follow the recipe to a tee, but for some reason, cooking escapes him. He always ends up burning something, and it never turns out as good as the recipe claims it should be.

Keith ends up staying at Lance’s far longer than he originally planned. Hell, he never actually intended to go inside Lance’s house, either, but there’s nothing he can do about it now. Not that he actually thinks he wouldn’t be able to manage to leave — he’s sure that if he stood at the door and meowed long enough, Lance would let him go — but he’s enjoying himself far too much.

Just… hearing Lance talk. Being in his presence, smelling his cooking, feeling Lance’s hand scratch his head every time he walks past the counter — it’s bliss.

So Keith stays there long past he was planning to, listening to Lance ramble on about his day to a cat. He listens as Lance talks about work and Starbucks giving him a pumpkin spice latte instead of a salted caramel frappucino and the person who was rude to him on the bus today.

He listens and sits there and when he finally leaves, finally returns home to lay in his bed as a human again, the only thought running through his head is, _well, shit._

\--

That’s when Keith starts using his powers for evil.

He’s not even really thinking about Lance, or the time he spent with Lance as a cat, when he’s walking home. But he passes the Starbucks and Lance’s voice pops into his head, saying something about salted caramel frappucinos, and suddenly he’s leaving the store with a coffee in hand, his face burning despite no one else but him knowing that he purchased a coffee for someone he has a crush on.

He spends the entire walk home debating what to do with the damned thing. He could knock on Lance’s door and claim they got his order wrong. Or he could say that witches have innate knowledge of their neighbor’s coffee preferences. He could even claim that Lance had mentioned it before and that Keith had wanted to repay him for the cat fountain.

Instead of doing any of these things, all of which have some trace of logic in them, he leaves the coffee on Lance’s doorstep, rings the doorbell, and races away. He only just manages to scramble over his fence in time, landing on top of his patch of belladonna and peeking through the gaps of the fence as Lance’s door opens.

He steps outside, looking around curiously before spotting the coffee. Lance picks it up, and at that moment, heart pounding and his breaths coming out shakily, Keith remembers a spell for invisibility.

Fuck. God. How is he ever going to interact with Lance like a normal human?

The answer escapes him, and Keith resorts to continue interacting with him as a cat instead.

He spends an afternoon there and watches as Lance accidentally tears his favorite sweater. He orders the same sweater to Lance’s house the very next day.

Lance tells Mr. Whiskers that his favorite food is Chinese. Keith orders Chinese and then offers it to Lance, claiming that he’s allergic to sesame seeds.

And when Lance’s pumpkin-scented candle burns out, earning only a disappointed, “Aw man,” from Lance, Keith goes ahead and invents a pumpkin-scented candle infused with a relaxation potion, designed to release the potion into the air as it’s lit. He then asks Lance to test it for him, stating that he wants a second opinion before he starts selling it.

In conclusion: Keith has gone stupidly head over heels for Lance, and he can’t even pinpoint when it began. Part of him wants to say it was those magic hands, or the generosity of buying Keith’s cat a fountain, or even the adorable if kind of obnoxious way he tried to trespass in Keith’s garden in order to pet a cat, but Keith fears it goes back further than that.

He fears that these feelings might’ve taken root when Lance first found out he was a witch and started asking him a bunch of stupid questions, or even when he first moved in, sweaty and shirtless in the middle of summer and yet still willing to offer Keith a cool smile, reaching out his hand to introduce himself.

Keith tries to ignore these feelings — he can’t imagine it’s a very good idea to date someone you live next to — but he’s doing absolutely nothing to help combat them. He’s still inclined to venture over to Lance’s house in cat-form a couple times a week, and he can’t for the life of him seem to stop buying Lance random goods that he probably doesn’t even need, simply because Lance off-handedly mentioned them to a _cat_.

But it all comes to a head one day when Keith and Lance are on Lance’s porch, Lance scratching Keith’s chin, when Lance looks over to Keith’s house and sighs.

“Why does he never come with you?” he huffs. “I swear, I thought your stupid owner would’ve asked me out by now.”

Keith spends about half a second feeling insulted over being called stupid before he registers the rest of Lance’s sentence. He has to physically restrain himself from running home and turning into a human just so that he can come right back over here, despite how suspicious that would seem.

Keith takes the much less suspicious route and waits until the next day.

His whole plan is to spend the day preparing to ask Lance out. He has a million ideas, none of them good, and is pretty sure he’s just going to knock on Lance’s door when he gets home and awkwardly stammer through some sort of confession.

Instead, he’s at work and stocking the shelves full of pumpkin candles (they worked great, Lance said), when the door chimes.

“I’ll be right with you!” Keith calls. He summons the box of candles, having them slide away from the center of the shop and closer to him, and places the last few on the shelf before vanishing the box entirely. When he turns, Lance is standing at the opening of the aisle.

“Shit!” Keith says, already blushing. “Sorry, you scared me.”

“Accident, I swear,” Lance says.

And then Keith opens his mouth and says, “Can I help you?” except for some reason it comes out as, “Can I take you on a date?” And, to top it all off, he’s forgotten that invisibility spell again, so he’s just standing there like an idiot, flushed and gaping and probably more shocked than Lance is.

But after Lance gets over his surprise, he laughs. He’s nodding, which is probably a good thing, and then he says, “Yes,” which is definitely a good thing.

“Cool,” Keith says. “Great. Can I help you with anything else?”

“Actually,” Lance says, “I’m good. I don’t think this is faulty anymore.” He holds up his wrist with the good luck charm and that, somehow, only adds to Keith’s embarrassment. He nods and blushes his way through the rest of the conversation, and when Lance leaves, Keith turns the sign on the door to *CLOSED*, just for a few minutes.

He goes into the back room and lays there, staring at the ceiling and convincing himself any of that actually happened.

\--

It’s three weeks later, after several successful dates — including home-cooked meals at Lance’s house — when the conversation Keith was dreading finally begins.

They’re sitting on Lance’s couch, having begun the night at a respectable distance and ended it pressed together, the TV playing at a low volume in the background. Lance’s fingers are playing through Keith’s hair, and he clears his throat.

“You know,” he says, “I haven’t seen Mr. Whiskers in a while.”

Keith does his best not to stiffen, but he has a feeling his best probably isn’t very good. “About that,” Keith says. “I have to tell you something about Mr. Whiskers.”

Lance snorts. “Keith, don’t worry,” he says. “I know.”

Keith sits up, turning to actually face Lance because — well, because he needs to see Lance for this conversation. “You _know_?” he says.

“I kind of figured it out,” Lance says.

“You figured it out,” Keith repeats, in sheer disbelief.

“It wasn’t that hard,” Lance says. “I mean, you’re a witch — it’s totally within the realm of possibility, right? Anyway, I think it’s cool that you can talk to cats.”

“That I can… okay,” Keith says. Because that’s just not right, but Lance is only getting started, apparently.

“You totally didn’t realize I knew!” he’s saying, giggling as he talks. “But I could tell you were sending him over here to spy on me! I’d mention something to Mr. Whiskers, and then — _boom_! There it is on my doorstep. You had such a big crush on me.”

That should be irrelevant, because they’re dating now and Lance also had a crush on him, but Keith blushes anyway. “Lance,” he says.

“It’s really cool, though,” Lance continues. “Like, that’s a superpower kids dream about, y’know? But is it _only_ cats you can talk to?”

“Lance.”

“He can still come over here even though you don’t need him to spy anymore. Not gonna lie, I miss the little guy these days.”

“LANCE.”

“What, babe?”

“I can’t talk to cats,” Keith says.

“You can’t?”

“No. I can turn _into_ a cat.”

Lance sits there, just staring at Keith. His mouth is open the smallest amount, and when he finally moves, it’s just to furrow his brows. “Wait…” he says.

“Yes,” Keith says, helping him reach the conclusion faster. “I’m Mr. Whiskers.”

“ _You’re_ —” Lance starts, and anxiety bubbles up in Keith’s chest. This’ll probably start an argument, right? Keith was _spying_ on Lance! He never thought of it that way, but that doesn’t make it any less true!

And then Lance bursts into laughter. He flings himself backward, so he’s almost hanging over the arm of the couch. He’s clutching his stomach, his feet kicking against the cushions as he wheezes.

“What’s so funny?!” Keith demands, and Lance manages to sit up, little giggles still escaping him.

“You’re Mr. Whiskers!” he says, and that sets him off again, except this time he’s leaning into Keith instead of dangling over the end of the couch. His fingers twist in Keith’s shirt and his body shakes against Keith’s as he gasps for breath. “You,” he says. “You!”

Keith huffs, slouching against the couch. “Shut up,” he grumbles.

“You like chin scratches.”

“Shut up!”

“Oh my God, did you actually use the fountain I got you?”

Needless to say, Keith finally remembers that invisibility spell, not that it manages to do him any good. He can’t actually run away, considering Lance is currently leaning against him, and after an alarmingly little amount of pleading, Keith concedes to turn into a cat.

And, really, Keith should’ve guessed that Lance would refuse to call him anything other than Mr. Whiskers when he was a cat. But Lance still scratches his chin and when turns back into a human, embarrassed beyond belief, Lance pecks him on the lips.

So. It’s not all bad.


End file.
